The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus and an operation controlling method of the image forming apparatus concerned.
In recent years, there have been proliferated in the market various kinds of MFPs (Multi Function Peripheral), which are provided with a printer function, a scanner function, etc. Associated with the increase of the functions to be provided with the MFP, the operations for setting the various kinds of functions have become complicated. To solve such the problem as abovementioned, it can be considered to make the display screen as wider as possible, so as to make it possible to display lots of information onto the display screen at a time. However, due to the limitations in regard to an installation space and a cost of required parts, it is not easy to widen the display screen, but, in reality, lots of information is displayed within a limited small-sized display screen. For instance, with respect to a keyboard screen from which characters are to be inputted, in order to arrange many character inputting buttons within a limited small area, each size of the character inputting buttons should be reduced, and/or, the character inputting buttons should be arranged as closely as possible. As a result, inputting operations to be conducted by the user may become difficult, and there has been fear that the erroneous inputting operations are liable to occur.
In view of the abovementioned background, a new method for improving the maneuverability of the MFP has been required. For instance, to cope with such the demand, Tokkai 2004-280519 (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication) sets forth the technology that includes: dividing the positional information recording medium into arbitral areas; respectively allotting specific functions to the above-divided arbitral areas on the application program or the system concerned; acquiring data and positional information written into each of the above-divided arbitral areas by using the positional information acquiring apparatus; implementing the specific function, allotted to the data within the concerned area, on the application program or the system concerned, based on the positional information acquired.
According to the technology set forth in Tokkai 2004-280519 above cited, since the area of the print product, into which the position detecting pattern is embedded in advance, is divided into the arbitral areas, and then, the specific functions are respectively allotted to the arbitral areas, so as to implement the specific function, allotted to the data within the concerned area, based on the positional information acquired, it is possible to implement the specific function of the concerned apparatus by operating the electronic pen onto the print product. However, according to the conventional technology abovementioned, there has arisen another problem that the maneuverability of the concerned apparatus becomes worse, due to the difference between the layout of the screen displayed on the apparatus and that of the print product.